Immigration courts in New York City are among the nation’s most generous in approving asylum claims, but approval rates differ greatly among the three immigration courts and the judges deciding cases, according to a Gothamist review of court data.
At New York City’s main immigration court, at 26 Federal Plz., judges approved 84.4% of asylum cases in the last fiscal year, compared to the 50.3% approval rate nationwide, according to the data. Judges at the Broadway Street immigration court approved 51% of cases, and judges at the Varick Street court approved 40% of claims. The federal fiscal year runs from Oct. 1, 2022, to Sep. 30, 2023.
At the same time, individual approval rates for judges across the three immigration courts ranged from a high of 96.7% to a low of 13.6%, according to the analysis of Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse data.
Researchers said the variations could be due to differences in the kinds of cases — such as differences in demographics or detention status — showing up in individual court dockets. But they say the disparities also reflect the powerful discretion judges have in deciding immigration cases. The TRAC data did not include details about specific claims.
“There’s sort of this asylum roulette,” said Mario Russell, the executive director of the Center for Migration Studies of New York. “That points to the inconsistencies of the system. How you fare depends on what region and what judge – even though the facts of your case might essentially be the same.”
Cases are generally assigned to different courts depending on where the applicant lives, according to Camille Mackler, the director of Immigrant ARC, a coalition of immigration attorneys across the state.
Even with recent federal asylum restrictions announced by the Biden administration, immigration policy experts and advocates predicted the city will remain a magnet for new arrivals. The city’s unique right-to-shelter rule is one reason cited by those researchers, even as the mandate to provide a bed to all who seek one has been eroded in recent litigation.
But the New York immigration courts also figure in the equation. When Texas Gov. Greg Abbott first started sending migrants to New York two years ago, Assistant Professor Austin Kocher of Syracuse University said, “Abbott is actually sending asylum-seekers to a court where they’re much more likely to be successful and much more likely to stay in the country.”
Here’s what to know about the state of asylum in New York City, amid an immigration influx in which over 200,000 migrants have come through city shelters the last two years, the vast majority seeking asylum.
For those seeking asylum, what’s the advantage to applying in New York City?
Nearly 63% of applicants in New York City immigration courts won asylum grants in the last fiscal year, compared to just over half of asylum-seekers in the country overall.
The approval rate at 26 Federal Plz., the city’s main and oldest immigration court, was the second-highest in the country at 84.4%. That court decided 36,468 immigration cases of all kinds in the last fiscal year, according to TRAC data, more than the city’s other two immigration courts combined. Nationwide, 674,075 immigration court cases were decided that year.
But, once more, approval rates at the two other New York City immigration courts were far lower. The approval rate at the Broadway Street immigration court was 51%, while the approval rate at the Varick Street immigration court was 40%.
Zooming out, what exactly is asylum and why do so many migrants want it?
Asylum-seekers are people across the globe fleeing their homeland for another country, exercising rights set forth under various United Nations agreements forged after World War II.
The protection allows an immigrant applicant to remain in the United States legally when they fear persecution or harm in their home country, while awaiting the decision of a judge or asylum officer considering their claim.
Asylum status is nearly identical to refugee status, but refugees must apply and wait abroad while their immigration case is processed. And, notably, federal rules bar asylum-seekers from receiving a work permit until at least six months after they apply for asylum.
What explains the regional differences in approval rates?
Immigration experts say one answer is the prevalence of particular nationalities in different parts of the country – as well as the different approval rates for those nationalities.
The TRAC data suggests it matters where people come from.
For example, in recent decades, U.S. judges have approved roughly one in four asylum claims for immigrants from the Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, according to a Gothamist analysis. Those three nations were the home countries of the vast majority of migrants in the United States until a few years ago.
Meanwhile, judges have approved over three quarters of immigrants from Egypt or Russia for asylum or other relief in the same time period. The differences arise in part from the different circumstances in each country, according to immigration experts. And some researchers suggest that U.S. foreign policy also plays a role.
What’s the picture among nationalities in New York?
Most nationalities have a higher approval rate at New York City’s main immigration court, compared to overall approval rates nationwide. But wide disparities persist. Roughly 99% of Uzbek immigrants were approved for asylum or other relief at the city’s main immigration court, compared to 32% of Guatemalans.
Marciana Popescu, a Fordham University professor studying asylum-seekers, said the disparities point to how the United States’ refugee resettlement and asylum processes are influenced by its foreign policy interests abroad.
“The ultimate factor that frames the decisions is the political factor,” Popescu said. “By granting asylum, what are you telling people? … The message you are putting out is that that country is not safe.”
Russians, for example, generally have high asylum approval rates, in part because of the United States’ adversarial relationship with the Russian government, she said. And the United States has provided Temporary Protected Status, another kind of immigration relief, for Venezuelans because of the U.S. government’s disapproval of the Venezuelan government, she added.
Meanwhile, former President Donald Trump sought to establish Guatemala as a “safe third country,” requiring those seeking asylum in the United States to first request protection in Guatemala, despite the prevalence of violence and corruption there.
“We don’t have any interest in Guatemala. But we also don’t have any interest in providing asylum to people from there,” Popescu said.
From the Trump administration’s perspective, Popescu said, there’s “nothing that we can gain.”
Can you say more about differences in approval rates among different judges in New York City?
Stark differences in approval rates show up there as well. Judge David Kim tops a list of 20 immigration judges – over a quarter of the total – who approved 80% or more of asylum claims they handled from fiscal years 2018 to 2023. On the other end of the spectrum, another dozen judges approved less than 40% of the cases they handled. Two judges granted asylum in less than 20% of the cases.
Some of the disparities in judges’ approval rates can be attributed to differences in cases referred to them, according to immigration researchers. But David J. Bier, the director of immigration studies at the Cato Institute, a national libertarian think tank, said “dramatic” variations still persist even when controlling for the types of cases being brought.
“It’s to that level where it is extremely subjective to the point of being arbitrary,” Bier said.
Judges who previously worked as immigration enforcement officers often rule differently than those who used to be immigration attorneys, he said. In some instances, siblings with cases before different judges have received opposite results, Bier added.
Does having legal representation matter?
It certainly looks that way. Nearly 50% of asylum applicants with lawyers were granted asylum or other relief, according to national TRAC data since about 2001. Meanwhile, nearly 20% of those without lawyers were approved.
In New York, nearly 70% of asylum-seekers with cases decided at the city’s main immigration court since around 2001 had attorneys, compared to 43% throughout the country, according to a Gothamist analysis of the TRAC data.
Popescu, from Fordham University, attributes the city’s more asylum-friendly courts to more progressive judges, local attorney trainings about forced migration, and organizations providing pro bono attorneys for immigration cases.
But as the number of immigration court cases has skyrocketed, increasingly fewer immigrants in New York courts are represented by attorneys, a recent Gothamist analysis found.
But don’t asylum-seekers also have to wait, and wait some more?
The newcomers stand in a long line. The number of asylum cases pending in federal immigration courts has surged to a record-high 3.7 million. Nearly 260,000 cases are pending in New York City’s main immigration court at 26 Federal Plaza. It has the second-highest backlog of any immigration court in the country.
Immigration court cases take an average of roughly a year and a half, or 531 days, to resolve, according to TRAC data. That wait time is slightly higher at New York City’s main immigration court, where cases have been pending for an average of 597 days.
While wait times have decreased in recent years, the case backlog has grown as a record number of asylum-seekers flock to the United States. One of the new Biden administration rules aims to fast-track the asylum court process and cut down on wait times, in part by weeding out improbable asylum claims sooner.
Immigration courts in five major cities, including New York, are charged with creating a new docket of asylum cases fast-tracked for review, with a goal for judges to decide cases within 180 days – about a third of the current wait. The new docket will target single adult migrants who illegally cross the border outside of authorized ports of entry.
